


michael mell's guide on how to hide your feelings (and maybe why you shouldn't) for dummies

by anastxsia



Series: wips [2]
Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Depression, Eventual Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Michael Mell Swears A Lot, Pining, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, this is my burned au lmao
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-31
Updated: 2018-10-31
Packaged: 2019-08-11 13:57:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,685
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16476857
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anastxsia/pseuds/anastxsia
Summary: Michael feels blue, and blue is fitting, because blue is, or blue was, Jeremy’s favourite colour.Blue fills his limbs with cement. Blue slows his heart. Blue pools in his ribcage, wedges in his throat, and comes out in choked gasps, and tears.Blue burns through his head and keeps him awake, keeps him thinking for hours on end about what he could’ve done, but didn’t.But nothing is wrong, and he feels like a fucking idiot for thinking that something is. Jeremy is happy, and that’s all he ever wanted.It doesn't matter if Michael is blue.





	michael mell's guide on how to hide your feelings (and maybe why you shouldn't) for dummies

**Author's Note:**

> this story is dedicated to my groupchat, the toxic trinity uwu  
> (love u jill & faith my favourite power couple)
> 
> also! quick author’s note!  
> unless stated otherwise, the time does not change from one scene to the next

 

It’s not often that Michael smokes.

That’s a surprise to hear, isn’t it? People at school call him a stoner twenty-four seven, and he fits the character archetype quite nicely, but that’s probably just because his dissociative antics, strictly sweatshirt couture and sleep deprivation-spurred red eyes.

But it’s been upwards of two weeks since Michael’s last twined a blunt between his fingers.

He figures there’s no better time than to succumb to the familiar, cylindrical shape again, so that he can just get lost, and forget this week ever happened.

Funny, right? His back is covered in bandages, pain is worming hotly beneath his shoulders, and yet here Michael is, lighter in hand, unafraid of fire.

Smoking seems like the best way to quiet the thunderstorm in his heart, to get rid of his trembling hands, his sunken stomach, his tired eyes, scarred skin and sad, tight-lipped frown, to just pretend, even if it’s only for one, single moment.

It’s what he needs most right now.

 _I’m sorry, Jeremy._ Michael thinks, his shaking fingers curling around the joint, staring at it blankly, and for the first time, hesitating to take a drag. _I’m sorry I wasn’t enough for you._

No one remembers what happened to Michael.

Of course they don’t, because there was so much happening.

Of course they don’t, because no one else was there.

Of course they don’t, because they just don’t care.

No one was there except Michael, and a thin, curly-haired boy with a freckled face and a forgotten smile. A boy who can’t see him, a boy who doesn’t even think of him, a boy who didn’t text him the morning after, or the day after, or the week after, to see if he was okay, to see if he made it out alive.

But Michael didn’t expect him to. Michael didn’t expect anyone to. It just hurts to think about how he would’ve, how different things would’ve been if time rewinded back three months ago.

No one watched as he fled through the backyard, coughing, wheezing for air.

No one saw him collapse on the side of the road, or call an ambulance, or be sped off to the hospital.

Look, Michael _gets it,_ okay? It’s selfish, somewhere, on some level, to think that even if it was just for a second, _someone_ wanted to know if he was okay.

In that moment, there was so much commotion, so much fear, there were fire truck sirens and panicked calls from concerned moms and dads—

So it’s not just selfish, it’s _stupid._ Stupid to get his hopes up that someone somewhere in that mess kept him in their prayers that night.

But no one visited him in the hospital, either, except his little brother and his parents, and the occasional waving passerby wanting to see Rich.

And no one knew that, just for a couple of minutes, Michael stayed in that burning house on _purpose,_ crying, suffocating, letting the burn creep up his back, watching the banister tumble and crash onto the floor, charred and in flames.

Sometimes, he asks himself why he didn’t stay inside.

Actually… he’s asked himself that a lot these last few days, and he knows _why._ There’s reasons why Michael didn’t just roll over and let himself die, there’s reasons why he chose to save himself, they’re just tough to remember sometimes.

But it’s fucking _whatever,_ you know? It’s been a week, almost two already, he should be way so over and done with this by now.

But he’s not.

That’s what the weed is for.

Michael didn’t want to resort to it, initially. He couldn’t, for the first little while anyways because you know, _hospitals and shit_ got in the way. Plus the smoke inhalation had really fucked over his lungs, and sometimes just breathing in the slightest bit of exhaust burned his throat alive, which isn’t exactly _pleasant._

Smoke inhalation though, isn’t the reason Michael’s hesitating, isn’t the reason why he’s been teetotalling pot, why— even though he has a lit joint between his fingers, and the ash is starting to collect on his lap— he’s just staring at it, like it’s some long lost friend.

 _Wouldn’t be the only fucking long lost friend I have._ Michael thinks.

Normally Michael would be so conservative of his pot, so eager to get stoned already, but right now, he’s just watching the lit end crumble into black, like it’s worth nothing to him.

He used to love getting high, because there was always someone there right beside him.

It’s hard to just ask the question. _Why?_

Why did Jeremy do it? Why did he want a new life? Why did he forget everything they ever had? Why did he give up on video-games and weed and two-in-the-morning Seven Eleven raids just to be popular?

Why wasn’t _Michael_ enough for him?

The reason it’s so hard to think about is because it just makes him so fucking _angry._

Anger is not an emotion one would typically associate with Michael Mell. Or at least, it _wasn’t._ Past tense. Sure, he had some minor bipolar issues as a kid, but he outgrew them, had a therapy success story, and honestly, despite the shit life threw at him everyday, he was fucking _happy._

Key word: _was._

“This is why I need you.” he mumbles, “‘Cause you help me forget about all this shit. ‘Cause don’t randomly just ignore me for no reason, then fuckin’, fuckin’—“

_I don’t know. Rip my heart out? Stomp on it too while you’re at it?_

Yeah, he’s talking to a joint, and yeah, it’s an inanimate object, but Michael doesn’t really have any actual people to talk to, especially about this… this— this _situation._

Michael wipes off the small pool of ash on his shirt; is careful not to move too fast, too recklessly, because then his shoulder’s gonna cry out in pain, and really, he doesn’t need that right now.

He’s hurting enough.

It’s a slow drag, a long drag, and after two weeks of abstinence and a _house fire_ escapade, it burns going down.

It burns like a bitch, actually. It lights up the frayed little nerves in his throat, crackling and sizzling in response to the smoke, but he endures it all the same. He doesn’t cough, doesn’t wheeze, doesn’t put the blunt down until it’s a full breath in, and full breath out.

He’s felt worse, he’s _feeling_ worse.

“I miss him.” Michael says, to really no one in particular, as he swallows down his urge to cough. His eyes are red, bloodshot even, and it’s not from the high. “God, I miss him.”

He misses everything about him. He misses the inside jokes, the late-night gaming sessions, the nicknames, the lunch time gossip spiels, and the karaoke car rides.

He misses petting those fluffy curls, and counting the number of freckles on that starmap of a face. He misses seeing those baby blues, and watching them look right back at him.

Michael’s still holding onto crumbling dreams, dreams where he’s cured of the SQUIP, dreams where things go back to normal, or at least, normal as things could get anymore.

It’s… just one of the few thoughts that made Michael jump through the window that night, that made him want to keep living, keep going.

It cuts deep, how little a chance he has at saving him. He doesn’t know how or where to start. Everything feels like a shot in the dark, and it terrifies him, the idea of never getting his best friend back.

He’ll always have his little brother, and his moms, and lola and lolo, and cousins, and aunts and uncles, because they’re family.

And family is forever, but it’s hard, okay? It’s fucking hard not to be sad about… him.

Jeremy Heere, who he thought was forever.

_Guess blood really is thicker than water._

He taps the glowing joint lightly onto the grass before it finds home again, pursed between his chapped lips.

 _Shit, Mell. Pull yourself together._ he thinks, taking another hit. _You’re thinking so much and it’s pissing me off._

It’s almost the middle of November, and while it’s warm enough tonight, it’s still cold, like it always is in New Jersey around this time of year. Michael’s nose is a little stuffy, but he’s still only wearing a loose, long-sleeved shirt.

It’s nice, the light breeze, the prickling, late autumn chill. It feels good against his rough skin and torn muscles.

Michael isn’t burned that bad, or at least, if you’re comparing him to someone like Rich Goranski, then he definitely got off easy, but there’s still scrapes and cuts and bruises dotting his body, and a messy patchwork of boils and blisters marred down his back.

But Michael’s lucky, actually, to not have any permanent injuries. That’s what every doctor he’s seen has told him, and trust him when he says he’s seen a lot lately. The only real problem is the scarring, and while they’ll fade over time, there’ll always be blemishes, just small reminders sullying his skin.

Can’t get off scot-free, he supposes, but it’s whatever. Michael just, won’t take off his shirt then, ever. Problem solved.

He’s lucky, okay? Lucky to have made it out alive. Luckier to have gotten out with a working body. Blessed with only minor lasting damages, blessed to not be paralyzed, blessed to still be able to breathe, to walk and talk and really, it could’ve been so much worse, it _should’ve_ been so much worse.

It’s just that, Michael’s the lucky one. He’s grateful.

(Supposed to be grateful.)

Because he isn’t. Just because he didn’t fucking _die_ doesn’t mean _this_ is a victory. Michael shouldn’t have been in there, he shouldn’t have wanted to _stay_ in there, just because of some arrogant ex-best friend who can’t see the obvious storm brewing right under his nose.

If Jeremy had just… listened to him.

It’s Michael with the scars. It’s Michael who has to feel this pain. It’s Michael who has to spend hundreds of dollars in physio and psychotherapy just to fix whatever happened to him on Halloween.

It’s Jeremy who’s doing just _fucking dandy._ It’s Jeremy who’s already walking the streets. It’s Jeremy who’s already back at school.

And the worst part about it? The absolute _worst?_

Jeremy doesn’t know if Michael’s dead or alive, but he’s moved on all the same.

Another struggled toke, another twist in his gut, another pang in his heart. It doesn’t matter. None of it matters. Michael thinks he’s on hit number four or five now, but fuck if he’s counting.

Smoking weed wasn’t always a coping mechanism for Michael.

Before, smoking weed was for him and Jeremy, and him and Jeremy only. Something to do when his parents weren’t home, or after a long week of micromanaging schoolwork, or just whenever they were bored out of their minds.

Getting stoned was never about numbing the hurt, because there was no hurt.

Again, key word: _was._

He blows out a plume of smoke, and that plume of smoke spins and twirls and morphs into the shape of a boy. A thin, curly-haired boy with a freckled face and a forgotten smile.

A boy who can’t see him, a boy who doesn’t even think of him, a boy who didn’t text him the morning after, or the day after, or the week after, to see if he was okay, to see if he made it out alive.

Jeremy comes to life in full depth and colour, wearing his high-waisted jeans, tricolour striped shirt, and flowy blue cardigan. His old clothes, because for some reason, Michael’s always found his geeky fashion sense kind of endearing.

With his photographic memory and overachieving creativity, the phantom is so detailed, looks so much like _him,_ that for a second, Michael lets himself get his hopes up, lets himself pretend.

His heart does that stupid thing again, the one where it thumps against his ribcage like a kettledrum. Stupid.

But Michael knows better, knows from the wobbly outline of his face and neck, to the tendrils of vapour crumbling off his body and the way he smudges into the backdrop, so close but so far away—

Jeremy isn’t here. He’s there in Michael’s head, and that, that will have to be enough.

Yeah, it’s better this way, because real Jeremy hurt him.

Imaginary Jeremy is there in front of him, sitting sidesaddle, staring back at him with those glassed-over, smoldering blue eyes. There’s something so off-putting, so weird about him, and it’s right there on his face.

Jeremy’s smirking up at Michael like he just _knows_ he’s better than him; like it’s something he’s just so sure about, like it’s not even up for debate, like it’s just a matter of fact versus fiction.

And maybe it is. Maybe he _is_ better than Michael.

It’s foreign, that look. Michael was so used to his kind eyes and shy grins, he didn’t even know Jeremy could look so… different. It’s barely recognizable. It feels wrong.

Michael saw it for the first time on Halloween, that same crooked smile, it was in the mirror of the bathroom, in the halls of the den, in the sparks and flames. It’s here in this smoke, just like it was nights ago in that damned house.

And it hurts so fucking much, hurts like a hot knife twisting and turning in his stomach, hurts like scrapes and cuts and bruises, like boils and blisters, hurts like betrayal.

He can’t escape it. It’s at every corner, in every window and nightmare, on every Instagram picture and Snapchat story, and it’s here, just to haunt Michael.

Halloween is the last time he’s seen Jeremy in flesh, the last time he’s heard Jeremy’s voice, the last time he’s considered him his friend.

“What’s wrong, Michael?” he says, and it doesn’t sound like Jeremy. It sounds like static, his voice, the kind you get from a TV when there’s no signal, the kind that sounds like white noise or nails dragging against a chalkboard. “You don’t normally smoke alone.”

Imaginary Jeremy shifts onto his haunches, and scoots a little closer to Michael, tilting his head at the lit blunt between his teeth, like he’s confused by its existence.

It’s so fake, it makes the bottom of Michael’s stomach drop out from under him, makes him want to throw up, makes him angry, makes him want to punch something or _someone._

_Like Jeremy would ever fucking care about me._

But Michael doesn’t move, doesn’t flinch, doesn’t even look away. He headily follows the trail of smoke left in Jeremy’s wake, then, as his breath hitches in his throat, he locks eyes with the boy.

Like he’s reading Michael’s mind— and he probably is, because he’s just a figment of his imagination— Jeremy giggles, leans in a little closer, and as Michael funnels out another puff of smoke, he licks his lips and breathes it in.

_I hate you, Jeremy._

Wants to say it. Wants to _scream_ it. Wants to _believe it_.

“I hate you,”

It doesn’t come out of his lips as anything but a broken whisper. It's so pathetic, Michael can’t even convince himself.

“Fuckin’ hate you, Jer.” he tries again, but he’s all bark and no bite. He knows better. He knows how he really feels.

And it looks like Jeremy knows better, too.

His wraith-like hand brushes gently against Michael’s cold cheek. Jeremy phases away at skin-on-skin contact, and his fingertips decay into dust, and Michael faces the painful fact that _he isn’t real._

“Mmn, yeah? S’that right, Micah?” he whispers, mouth dangerously close to Michael’s ear.

But pet names have always sounded better on Jeremy’s tongue, and Michael’s knees go weak anyway.

Jeremy breathes thinly, hovers over Michael’s face, and sweeps in for a soft peck. Sadly, he only gets as far as a butterfly kiss before falling apart, and disappearing off the face of the Earth.

That’s where it all comes crashing down.

Because he realizes: he’s still in love.

Michael’s heart splutters and croaks, struggles under the weight of this pain, labours a slow, choked rhythm, and just barely keeps him alive.

_Of course I still fucking love you._

Michael is just slowly learning what it means to really be dead.

 

* * *

 

Weeks fly by, somehow.

It goes by easy enough. It's one, two, three days, then they just start blurring together, and as Michael’s birthday passes, the calendar flips into December, and the talk of the town shifts from fire safety to high-school theatre, he keeps finding himself in the same bleak grey area.

Some limbo between dead and alive.

Time goes by so fast, but so painfully slow. On the days Mell actually gets up for school, he sometimes sees Jeremy in the halls.

Though, he can’t remember the last time he’s seen Jeremy’s smile, can’t remember the last time he’s heard Jeremy’s laugh, can’t remember the last time Jeremy’s looked at him or had any life in his eyes.

Then Michael was wrong before, because that, that was what hurt most, knowing that even now, Jeremy is still not happy.

But what can Michael do? He’s so close, he’s, at most, just a courtyard away, but he may as well be in the stars.

His dimples, his eyes, they don’t crease like they used to, and Michael’s almost a hundred percent sure that the smile lines embedded in Jeremy’s skin are fading more and more each day.

Maybe he’s using scar cream. Maybe the SQUIP thinks they’re ugly. Michael would beg to differ, but he can’t spend too much time doting from afar.

 _It’s best to avoid him._ _He can’t fucking see you._ his brain helpfully supplies, because whenever he sees that damned freckled face and cursed forgotten smile, he freezes up, and stops in the middle of the hallway. _Just keep walking, bastard._

Michael’s been swearing a lot more lately, too, but that’s okay, there’s been tons of changes since the fire, and the unexpected spike in his cursing tendency is just one of them.

For starters, it’s been dreadfully quiet in the halls of a mourning Middleborough without the school’s resident shrieking lighthouse, Rich Goranski.

He isn’t the boss of course, but he’s certainly a character of interest, and it feels weird not seeing him around. You can’t miss him, he’s different from all the other popular kids: he’s short, childishly eccentric, and does whatever you want him to if you just say the words “ _I double dog dare you_ ”, like a genie granting wishes.

There’s just a lack of atmosphere in the halls, it’s unusually dull, and mechanical, and slow. Sometimes, Michael misses the noise.

Weird, right? He’s never liked Rich, and that’s obvious. Sure, Michael barely knew anything about him, but from sophomore year up until _now,_ Rich was his bully, and not just _his_ bully, but Jeremy’s, too.

Rich was the musculed mastermind behind the snide threats, the vulgar insults, and the crude pranks that tormented the duo. Rich was the puppeteer of a monolithic pack of dumb jocks who just _loved_ to obey his every order, loved to reek havoc, loved to terrorize the wimps and geeks at his command—

Above all, Rich is face of where this all started. Michael doesn’t understand why he did any of it, but Rich was the one who destroyed Jeremy’s self-confidence, who told him about the SQUIP, made him popular, and who ruined a twelve year friendship in the process.

But Michael still couldn’t help but feel bad for the guy. Because empathy is one hell of a drug.

He’s still in the hospital almost a month later— or he’s at least in home care— recovering. Now that his absences have been going up, Michael realizes how he’d gotten a slap on the wrist in comparison to the sheer number of skin grafts and surgeries Rich had, and still has, to go through.

And then there’s the rumours about Rich’s mental health, rumours about a rough homelife, rumours that Rich _set_ the fire, and if those are true— and Michael isn’t saying they _are,_ because he’s not one for gossip— then he’s probably being treated for that, too.

It’s just that, Michael can’t imagine that Rich’s life is easy either. Those constant appointments and having to endure— God forbid— _hospital parking_ , time and time again, it must be grating.

In school, he sees that same group of assholes that used to hang around Rich in the halls sometimes too. If you catch them at the right time, as Michael learns, it looks like they’ve already forgotten about their leader entirely, laughing and playing and muttering snarky comments about the next common bystander’s hair or outfit.

But then a second passes, and as they drone Jake or Rich’s locker or one of the small booths promoting fundraising in their honour, their shoulders slump sadly, and it’s back to a quiet vigil.

It’s like the entire school is grieving people who aren’t even dead, and Michael still hasn’t decided if he likes the grim change of pace.

With it came the talk about maybe postponing, or even cancelling the winter play, but ultimately, the idea is shot down by Mr Reyes, and his small herd of tenacious young theatre devotees.

Michael’s surprised they spent so much effort on resuscitating a play _literally_ called _A Midsummer’s Nightmare About Zombies_ , because frankly, it sounds like some sort of cringy post-apocalyptic spinoff based off of a William Shakespeare classic, and he’s probably not too far off.

He assumes the modern twist was added due do some budget cuts, a lack of membership, and the empty threats about closing the program on behalf of the board. You know, Michael could really picture some teachers in the staff lounge brainstorming the day away, asking themselves how they could appeal to youth, and finally one shoots up, yelling “I’ve got it!”.

Thus, _A Midsummer’s Nightmare About Zombies._ Posters of it are everywhere, and when he sees them, in the back of his mind Michael says, _Huh. Isn’t Jeremy in that one?_

But he regrets thinking about it, because now, he’s angry again, and his chest suddenly starts hurting, and his fists are clenched up, and he’s frozen in place, frozen in time, and he’s standing absently in the hallway, and he thinks: _God, I’m going fucking mad_.

Some time after, he gets back on track, though what that track actually _is_ he isn’t sure yet, but it probably involves getting to class on time.

Sometimes, there’s laughter, sometimes, there’s smiles, and sometimes, there’s happy, idle chit-chat, but it never lasts long. It always turns hushed, then, within the next couple of seconds, dies out completely, and Michael is left wondering why.

Wondering whether or not they’re _trying_ to quiet, like as if they all need to fit into some sort of silent status quo, just to be respectful.

It’s a sham, Michael concludes eventually. His suspicions are confirmed after seeing Valentine shut up Brooke’s offbeat giggles with a slap on the back and a sharp glare to the lockers, vandalized in glued-on _Get Well Soon!_ cards and filtered photographs.

Everyone— even people who didn’t know or talk to Rich— is just acting like they’re sad he’s gone, because they feel like they _should_ be.

In reality, Michael suspected this. Rich is a dick. He’s just an important dick who’s made headlines in a cast of other dick caricatures, including Jeremy Heere, that’ve all made a name for themselves at Middleborough.

Still, without the entire lineup of popular kids, everything at school just feels _off._ Torturous all the same, but _off._

Since the fire, nobody’s picked on Michael, which again, is off. It’s not like he was bullied every single day beforehand, it’s just that when people saw him, there’d be wary stares and pointed mumbling, sometimes harsh jabs or tripping attempts.

Maybe Michael is just invisible now, or something. Maybe they’re waiting for Rich to come back so he gets the first blow. Maybe they figured out what happened to him. Maybe picking on Michael is just like beating a dead horse now.

Or maybe they just don’t care, and that’s probably it. Bullies are usually dumb, and don’t really have a second, deeper thought process past venting out their repressed daddy issues and tough childhood physically on other people.

But whatever the case, the gesture— if it _is_ intentional, which he has a hunch that it actually might be— doesn’t fall on deaf ears. Michael’s school day is just a little easier without having to face an onslaught of gay jokes, schoolyard taunts, or worse, the possibility of someone calling him a loser, and reminding him of that fateful night.

So he’s grateful. Grateful is a good word for it, because as dramatic as it sounds, Michael prefers mourning his friendship with Jeremy in bittersweet silence.

 

* * *

 

After Halloween, Michael came to the realization that he’d be spending his up and coming birthday with _out_ Jeremy, and _God,_ that was a change that he does _not_ like.

Because Michael and Jeremy always spend— or always spent— their birthdays together, and not even just birthdays, but every holiday. Even Christmas, which wouldn’t be so unbelievable, until you take into account the fact that Jeremy is _Jewish._ He’s pretty sure that’s sacrilegious.

It’s just, look, Michael can’t _actually_ remember his last Jeremy-free birthday.

Somewhere in elementary school, and if he had to guess the year exactly, probably in the second grade. Even then, it wasn’t Jeremy’s fault, his family went on an early winter vacation, and he compensated by stealing his mom’s phone, and texting Michael hundreds of _Happy Birthday_ -related messages.

But he won’t be getting that this year.

So yeah, Michael Mell’s seventeenth birthday doesn’t exactly go to plan.

Thing is, three months ago, Michael was _excited_ to turn seventeen.

Seventeen is _the_ golden teenage year, some say, because while you’re not allowed to drink or smoke legally, you _are_ able to drive, and you’re still a kid, too, still allowed to be irresponsible, still young,

But that was three months ago, and three months feels like a forever ago.

And without Jeremy, without that distraction or fun in his life anymore, Michael is left to sulk about his age alone, because he can’t find anything else to think about.

The first five minutes of consciousness on his birthday are slow, and painful. He feels heavy, and sad, and honestly, he just wants to go back to bed.

The world record beating time of how fast his mood drops tells Michael that today is just going be _one of those days._

Those dark, depressing days.

It’s a school day, too, or it’s supposed to be, but it looks like his moms apparently had mercy on him this morning, since when he first checks his clock, it’s already eleven.

So he simply sits in his bed, ends up staying there for hours on end, not sleeping, just staring up at the ceiling, and counting the minutes that go by without any feeling in his muscles. His curtains are closed, his lights are off, though the smallest drop of Sun creaks through the underside of his drapes, bathing the once pitch black room into a bleak dimness.

Michael can just make out the corners of his ceiling, and the sketchy contours of his bedroom furniture, and so he spends the early afternoon just following the faint builds with his eyes, and filling in the blanks with his imagination.

Somewhere along the line, though, his imagination betrays him, and he starts talking to himself.

Or well actually, it starts off with himself, and a small, passing memory. That passing memory, like most tend to do now a days, trickles into a train of thought, then bleeds into a feeling, and from there, like a bullet, that feeling barrels down his throat, lodges into his chest, and drills nails into his heart.

His breathing draws thinner and thinner, because it upends Michael’s life, and one way or the other before he knew it, the shapes around him were changing and twisting and bending, until the same phantom boy sat ever so nervously on the ledge of his bed, twiddling with his thumbs.

See, Michael isn’t dumb, and figures that their first little faux encounter cemented another— more _alternative_ — coping mechanism into his brain, and here’s why:

Sometimes, sometimes he catches small glimpses of his make-believe Jeremy from time to time, and not just in his dreams. Whether he’s wandering around in his house, or waving to Michael in the hall at school, or just watching him patiently from afar, he’s still in Michael’s head, and doesn’t look like he’s leaving anytime soon. It turns out, it’s not some side effect from smoking possibly-laced pot.

They’re just for brief, touch and voiceless moments, and it doesn’t even stun Michael when he disappears into a puff of smoke, as if he was never there in the first place.

It doesn’t stun Michael at all, and maybe it should. It’s just — he’s aware they’re fake, aware that they’re unnatural, aware that he should probably talk to a psychiatrist about them, but he doesn’t do anything. He’s okay with this, oddly enough, because someway, somehow, on some level, it’s comforting, it makes his days easier, and it’s not like he _can’t_ stop.

Michael isn’t hallucinating, per se— or at least not in the traditional sense— because the second he doesn’t want to see Jeremy, he poofs away. They’re hallucinations, sure, but they’re hallucinations Michael can _control._

“You wanted to see me?” Jeremy says, softly, so softly that Michael almost smiles. _Almost._

Michael feels like a kid again, because he’s got an imaginary friend. Granted, that imaginary friend of his is completely and utterly based off an old model of his in real life ex-best friend, Jeremy Heere, but that’s neither here nor there.

“Birthdays feel weird without you,” Michael breathes, sitting up to get a better look. He’s dressed in different clothes today, because Michael has enough of Jeremy’s redundant old wardrobe memorized to give him multiple outfits, as creepy as that might be.

It’s not that creepy, they were friends for twelve years damnit, cut him some slack.

Jeremy smiles. His dimples and eyes crease like they used to, and those two, happy grooves either side his mouth is an absolutely heavensent gift from God Himself.

Then, he says the words that real Jeremy Heere won’t say to him, that real Jeremy Heere won’t even text to him.

“Happy birthday, Michael.”

Michael swallows down that bitter taste, bites his tongue, and lets himself fall into this, grinning back at the imposter like he’s real.

“Thanks.”

His blanket slips off his torso as his hands reach up and run nervously through his bedhead. Something about Jeremy— real or fake— just makes his pulse race.

“Ew, put a shirt on.” giggles Jeremy, seeing his bare chest. It sounds like something Jeremy would say, too, and as he goes to grab the one Michael threw at the foot of his bed yesterday night, his hand clips through it, but Michael isn’t surprised, and Michael isn’t disappointed, because Michael knew it’d happen anyways.

He scoffs, shrugs, and ignores Jeremy’s protests. That shirt stinks anyway. “I have to shower soon, so fuck you.”

Jeremy tilts his head in interest. “Oh yeah, dinner tonight, right?”

Michael nods like it matters as he stretches out his arms. He wonders idly, what his mothers would think, if they just walked in and saw him having some one-sided, animated conversation with _himself._

“You excited?”

Realistically it’s a nice restaurant, he’s only ever been to it twice before, and Michael is a _little_ excited because the food there last time was absolutely orgasmic.

Still, there’s just one problem:

“Not really.” Michael grumbles petulantly, kicking his legs off the bedside, plunking his two feet square on the ground. “You won’t be there.”

Jeremy rolls his eyes, and stays put. “I can be. I just, won’t talk.”

“I know. I guess you can’t _really_ be there, but come anyways.” says Michael, eyeing Jeremy up and down. Not for the first time, and certainly not for the last, he thinks about just how weird it is, talking to a man-made replica of his former best friend. “Wear something nicer though.”

“You could literally make me naked if you wanted to, nobody’s gonna see.”

Michael shouldn’t picture that. So he doesn’t, obviously, not even for a split second, not even accidentally. It doesn’t take up one frame in his mind.

“Don’t tempt me.” Michael jokes — or well, _half-jokes,_ because he isn’t going to lie and say it isn’t a little teensy tiny bit enticing.

But yeah, this is already weird enough, so no thanks.

(That night, they take a family picture together at the restaurant, and although Jeremy was clearly standing right behind Michael, beaming like he always used to do, he doesn’t show up in the actual photograph when it prints out.

Again, it’s not disappointment he feels, it’s loss.

Michael misses _his_ Jeremy. The _real_ Jeremy, and he hopes that someday, someday he’ll get him back…

…. or at least, someday, Jeremy will get himself back.)

 

* * *

 

The aftermath of the party turns out to be… bad, or at least, a lot worse than Michael anticipated. School is still a reminiscent hellscape a month and a half later, in the middle of _December._

Of course, there are _some_ good days, days where Michael doesn’t mind it, but that’s rare, and is greatly outnumbered by how many mornings he wakes up to where its sheer torture just _thinking_ about having to get out of bed, about having to try, and having to see other people.

He started to worry, at some point, that he’s going to fail the eleventh grade.

But his moms talked to the board about it, and even though the students don’t know anything, his teachers understand that he has a severe— his moms exaggerated just _a little_ — injury in his back, plus some mental health issues here and there, so Michael’s been put into online courses to make sure he passes.

In actuality, it’s depression that keep him from going, because he can move just fine— albeit with some soreness in the scarred tissue— but he has a hunch that if they said that, then he’d probably still be forced to attend.

America’s take on mental health issues is to just ignore them, until they goes away.

It’s good though, how things turned out, or at least it’s good enough. Michael doesn’t mind doing school work as long as long as it's from the comfort of his bed, and he’ll sometimes show up to class if he’s really feeling it.

Which he doesn’t, most days. Sure, he’ll get up to do chores, and to eat, and to say hi to his family, but sometimes, he feels too heavy and too stiff to even try moving. As if gravity’s sole purpose is to pull Michael Mell down into the Earth’s core, to sink him deeper and deeper into cushion of his mattress until he just falls through.

His bed feels like his tomb, a soft, comforting, warm crypt, a grave-to-be, and even though he might not want to die, Michael is too cold and too tired to stop it from happening. To stop himself from rotting away, just underneath his covers.

It’s pathetic. Nothing is wrong, but everything is.

He feels blue, oh so very, very blue, and blue is fitting, because blue is, or blue was, Jeremy’s favourite colour. Blue fills his limbs with cement. Blue slows his heart. Blue pools in his ribcage, wedges in his throat, and comes out in choked gasps, and tears. Blue burns through his head, and keeps him awake, keeps him thinking for hours on end about what he could’ve done, but didn’t.

But nothing is wrong, and he feels like a fucking idiot for thinking that _something_ is. Jeremy is happy, he thinks, and that’s all he ever wanted.

So it doesn't matter, really, if Michael is blue or not.

“Michael?” his mom, Sloane says, and the door clicks open, the light from the hallway creaks through the opening, and Michael screws his eyes shut.

Thing is, he hadn’t even realize he’d woken up today. Reality just feels so much like a fucking nightmare, like some bad feverdream, that he can never tell the difference anymore.

“Yeah?” Michael whispers, squinting open his eyes.

He wonders, idly, how long he’s been lying here, awake and unmoving, barely conscious. Michael doesn’t check his phone, so he doesn’t know what time he woke up at, or what time it is now. Or what day it is, or what month it is, really. Time just passes by him, and there’s nothing Michael does or can do about it.

“How’re you feeling?” she asks tentatively, tip-toeing into his bedroom.

It could be thirty years into the future, he could’ve just been withering away for the last couple decades, and honestly, he wouldn’t know the difference.

But judging by the same worn lines etched into either side of his mom’s eyes, it’s still December.

Michael yawns, he’s tired, sickly, and blue, and—

“Fine.” he croaks, because it’s hard enough dealing with all this, but it’s harder seeing the concern on her face.

And not just Sloane’s, but Nikita’s, and his brother, Jakob’s, too. They’re his parents, his siblings, his family— they’ve done enough for him, and they don’t deserve to feel bad for _this._ “You?”

“Oh, you know, the… the usual.” she says, and she’s blue, too.

It’s not right, she isn’t telling the truth, and Michael knows that. Isn’t going to pry though, because there’s nothing he can do about it, anyways.

Michael has never felt like more of a problem child in his entire life, and as much as he just wants them to stop worrying, _he_ can’t stop hurting.

 _I’m sorry,_ he thinks— but doesn’t say— to his family. _I don’t want to be like this either._

Instead he says, “Er, anything I can do, mom?” and convinces himself to sit up. A slow process, but he’s starting to gain some feeling, maybe even some energy, in his limbs, which is better. An improvement. He’s gonna have to get out of bed sometime today.

“Could you shovel the driveway after dinner? Your mother’s at work right now, and it snowed a lot today.” Sloane asks, plastering on her best bright-eyed and bushy-tailed faux smile, but it’s moot to Michael. He can see just how exhausted she is.

A smile doesn’t hide her deep set dark circles, her droopy eyelids or the soft, barely noticeable way the pulled corners of her mouth twitch when trying to grin.

Michael makes a noncommittal hum while he mulls it over, then, despite the protests of his rigid arms and legs, and the pool of lead sealed in his stomach, he nods his head. It’s the least he could do for putting them under so much stress. “What time is it now?”

“Oh, um.” she stammers, then checks her watch before saying: “About three thirty.”

Again, he doesn’t know if it’s been two, three, maybe even four hours since he first woke up today, it's hard to say, but if his hunger is any indication, then yeah, it’s been a while.

Sloane stands there in his room, on pause, leaning one way, then the next, swaying awkwardly as she takes in the state of Michael’s room. It’s gotten considerably messier as of late, looks like its well passed “lived in”, but she, despite her sarcastic nature, doesn’t comment on it.

Michael almost wants to thank her for saving him the trouble.

She _does_ say before she leaves that dinner won’t be for another couple hours, and that Michael should probably eat something before then, but that’s all. She leaves a minute later, and sometime after, Michael’s stomach— without running it by his brain first— decides that she has a point.

 

* * *

 

Supper was fine. Quiet, but fine.

Look, Michael doesn’t talk that much anymore, because he’s just so _angry_ all the time, and he tries, and has always tried, to live by the rule that if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.

So for the entirety of the dinner, the two of them sat in a thick span of solitude. They were only a metre apart, and so, so close to conversation, but they were somehow still too far away.

It wasn’t even tense, just dead silent. Kind of pathetic, actually.

But Michael didn’t care, or at least he didn’t care enough to change it. He spoke only when spoken to, and didn’t bother initiating any small-talk with his mother past simple pleasantries and social cues.

(Because really, what’s the point anymore?)

After the meal, he files his plate away into the dishwasher, buckles up his boots, suits up into his jacket, then heads outside, spade in hand.

Sure, it’s not fun, but it isn’t a new responsibility, either. Since he was a kid, he’s been tasked with annually shovelling the snow off their driveway, and he’s done it so many times that Michael can mechanically dig through to the pavement on autopilot.

It’s still December, it’s still cold, and dark, and windy, and his body heat can only do so much for him, but he doesn’t care. He thinks he tastes blood in his frozen-over throat, thinks his gloved fingers have turned into icicles, thinks they’re going to snap off, along with _all_ of his limbs and appendages, but Michael could give a _lesser fuck_ about what nature thinks is good for him.

On some level, shoveling snow is kind of therapeutic. Of course, it doesn’t get rid of his problems, but it does help distract him. He’s heard psychologists talk about how exercise helps release endorphins or whatever in the brain, but Michael’s just now starting to think that that might be true.

Maybe that’s why he doesn’t care about coughing up blood, or getting hypothermia, or frostbite, or worse. Now that he’s started something, he can’t stop, because Michael doesn’t want to do nothing again, because doing nothing is dangerous.

And for someone who spends most of his days bedridden, Michael is still fit, still somewhat athletic, and still strong, so he doesn’t mind the heavy lifting. He can handle it, and if he can’t, well then he’ll make himself handle it.

Seeing the outcome is especially satisfying. It’s been an hour, and normally he’d half that time (albeit, sloppily), but some innate perfectionistic instinct kicked in, and even the littlest smidge of snow on the blacktop frustrated him.

Like he said: it got his mind off just how fucked up his life is, so of course he’d try and draw it out as long as possible.

But eventually, the snow was cleared, and his aching muscles bore through to him. He was going to have to stop at some point.

In the end, their plowed-off driveway, with two banks of snow framing either side of the garage, will have to be enough for him.

It does looks great, though. So great that Michael almost wants to snap a picture of it, because he _knows_ it’ll be ruined by tomorrow morning after tonight’s snowfall.

Ultimately, he decides that he doesn’t really have anyone to show it off to anyways, so he saves it in his memory, and calls it a night.

And by “calling it a night”, he means showering, getting stoned, and hopefully passing out before he starts thinking too much.

 

* * *

 

Michael likes to think he’s gotten better at coping with the damages left after Halloween.

Of course, he’s wrong. That’s just a fact, proven time and time again by how often he comes out here.

Out into his garage, stargazing, with a bright, rasta-themed bong at his side.

Michael _used_ to not smoke often, sure, but that’s changed. Weed just… makes his life easier, makes the pain a little easier to bare.

Sure, every time he succumbs to it, he feels weak, telling himself that it’s wrong to resort to it, but it’s the only thing he has to rely on anymore.

Getting better just seems so far-fetched, okay? He promises he’ll do it, it’s just taking him a lot longer to bounce back than expected.

But he guesses that’s just what happens after you lose someone who mattered so much to you.

After all, he isn’t the same Michael Mell without him.

Because Michael Mell was confident, was funny, and flirty, and loud, and _happy._

Michael Mell wasn’t burned, wasn’t broken, and tired, and angry, and _blue_ all the time.

He isn’t quite sure how Jeremy did it, how he wormed his way into Michael’s life, into his heart, how he stripped that all away just with a couple of negligent weeks and one simple sentence.

Michael Mell had a best friend who mattered the world to him, and when that best friend left him, when it all crashed and burned, the world did too.

And now he doesn’t know what to do, or where to go, or how to move on. He doesn’t even know _why_ it all happened in the first place.

When you sum it all up like that, Michael isn’t even a _husk_ of who he once was. He’s barely a Walmart brand rip-off of himself.

It’s weird being _just_ Michael. Just another face in the crowd, another nerd to point and shout at, another nameless student with no friends, and no life.

You should understand now, why he wants to get rid of everything. Everything and anything that reminds him of what he used to be.

So that’s why he brings out a hollow metal bucket, a lighter, and a medium-sized box, too.

Michael doesn’t normally smoke out here, he actually likes the porch a bit better because there’s a couch swing, but it’s winter, and their garage is heated. Simple math.

Their garage still had that nullified, quiet atmosphere that the night gives off; it’s dark and isolated, and absolutely perfect.

It’s just the right amount of solitude he needs, because even sometimes his room feels cramped, and suffocating, and like all the walls are caving in on him.

So he sits on the threshold of the garage, in a big, fold-up camping chair— one that he likes to use to watch fireworks in in the neighbourhood park on the fourth of July— and just _unwinds._

Michael wants to be old. Old and over and done with these _feelings._

The first hit is easy enough, and so he goes for a second, then a third, then ten minutes pass and he’s already feeling numb. Numb-er, which is really the goal here.

 _Great._ he thinks, grabbing his lighter. _So it’ll hurt less when I burn all this shit._

What he’s brought out with him is a bucket, and a box. To most, it’s just a regular old shoebox, spray-painted orange, with unintelligible two names scrawled on the bottom panel.

But to him, and to a Jeremy he knew in the past, this box holds their entire lives together.

Inside, there are printed photographs, souvenirs, posters from old obsessions, and several exchanged letters from when Michael got kicked out of the Heere household (on behalf of a nine-year-old-Jeremy’s mother) for swearing.

Call him a hoarder, whatever, he doesn’t care. His moms insisted on him keeping up to date on it, and frankly, it’d grown to be one of Michael’s favourite side hobbies.

Over the years, he’s forgotten to add some things— the wristband they got when they went to Universal Studios, the patterned lanyard from a seventh grade field trip to which they stayed in the same cabin in, maybe a couple photos here and there— and there were others that just downright too unmemorable to save, but it’s still a pretty hefty box.

They’re just keepsakes, really. Toys and trinkets and memorabilia that a Michael Mell from just three months ago wouldn’t dream of ever throwing away, let alone burning.

But he’s not that Michael Mell from three months ago.

He figures that if he doesn’t do this _now,_ then he probably never will. Michael knows himself better than anyone, he’ll stall and stall, tuck it under his bed and keep leaving it there, day after day.

So he fumbles with the yellowing page of an old journal entry from Jeremy, and doesn’t even want to _bother_ reading it again. He does, anyway, and the coil in his chest tightens in frustration, but it’s from too long ago, it doesn’t matter anymore. It shouldn’t matter anymore.

He holds it for a brief moment over the bucket, hesitating, before taking the leap, lighting one of the corners, and dropping it in, revelling in the heat his new hearth gives off.

Sure, it’d just be easier to dump the box in whole, but:

 **a)** That’d be a waste of a perfectly good box **.**

 **b)** It’s a safety hazard, that fire might get out of control and lash back out of him, and God knows that boy already has too many burn scars to even count anymore.

And, and well

 **c)** Michael wants to hold every memory in his hands, wants to feel the history he’s destroying, wants to rewind and relive them one last time before throwing them in the pit.

It’s painful, yes, but that’s okay. Michael is used to it; used to that sinking feeling, that skin-crawling ache, the gut-wrenching sickness and the hiss in his ear whispering those awful, awful nothings.

 _Fuck you._ he thinks, as he flings a picture of two prepubescent boys posing anxiously at their eighth grade graduation ceremony into the makeshift bonfire.

In goes a friendship bracelet, in goes another Post-it note doodle, another cootie catcher, whatever useless knick knacks a younger Michael thought were worth keeping.

“Magic the Gathering card he gave me for the birthday no one else remembered,” Michael mumbles, and he needs another drag, because he's feeling a little itching heartache, a little nagging woe. Then, as his eyes flick over the page, and he reads Jeremy’s messy scrawl: “Burn it.”

Michael pauses for a second, takes a slow toke off the lip of his bong, then picks up a small, faded slip of paper.

“Ticket stub from our first concert.” he says, and he remembers that night so vividly, he can almost go back in time to see a nervous twelve year old Jeremy Heere at his doorstep, wearing baggy merchandise and a mini North Face Berkeley backpack.

He didn’t like smiling then, because he’d just gotten his braces and _hated_ showing people, but he couldn’t stop himself then. They’d been waiting for that night for _months._

“Weird Al.” Michael scoffs. “Super burn it.”

It falls out of his fingers, sinks onto the metal floor, and erupts in flames, like a dying phoenix.

Watching it happen is a weird experience in itself. He’s witnessing his the good times burn, seeing his life fall apart at the seams, feeling his heart breaking, and orchestrating it all from the safe vantage point of a spectator booth.

When he sobers up from this high, when the weed finally wears off and he has to come to grips with reality, he might regret doing this, but by then, it’ll be all said and done. It won’t matter how he feels, because he’ll eventually understand that this is all for the better.

“Michael!”

Michael groans.

“Mom, I’m busy—“ _wait._

That’s not Sloane’s voice. Or Nikita’s voice. That’s not even a _woman’s_ voice.

 _Jakob?_ Michael thinks, but Jakob isn’t a fucking _man_. He’s an eleven year old, and has the vocal chords of one, too, so _who the fuck?_

Michael’s head shoots up, his hand reaching skeptically around his back to shuffle his bong out of sight and out of mind. He’s not getting arrested tonight, no thank you.

But it’s there he realizes a paunchy figure in his driveway, in all his bathrobe-donning glory.

“Mr Heere?!”

 

**Author's Note:**

> follow me on [tumblr](https://anastxsiaus.tumblr.com/)!
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> [EDIT 03-13-19] don't think im gonna continue this fic anymore just bc lack of inspiration to complete it, might continue it at a later point when im free to write whenever, currently school has been fucking me up the rear now a days so


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